ABSTRACT

It is critical for students to be provided with opportunities to learn in settings that foster their academic growth. It is equally important that schools endeavor to be a place where students’ social and emotional needs are met as well. However, due to lack of funding, over-testing, inappropriate evaluation measures, and other persistent policy pressures, our public schools have often resorted to a focus on raising standardized test scores through direct instruction with an increasingly narrowed curriculum. As a result, schools have often become places in which students, rather than being seen as valued future members of a productive society, are part of the bleak statistics that shine a spotlight on how our schools have failed to motivate and connect with the students of today. Consequently, many educators have come to believe they are not influential enough to make a significant difference, and have resigned themselves to accepting their current situation. The problem with this thinking is that it minimizes the purpose of the job we promised to do – to educate.

The innovation I implemented and describe in my dissertation can be characterized with one word – dialogue. Dialogue that occurs for the purpose of understanding and learning more about that which we do not know. In this innovation, I endeavored to demonstrate how social learning by way of dialogic discussion could not only support students’ academic growth, but their social and emotional growth as well. Results from the data collected and analyzed in this study suggest social learning had a highly positive impact both on how students learned and how they viewed themselves as learners.

Education is one of the cornerstones of our country. Educational opportunities that help meet the academic and social-emotional needs of students should not be seen as a privilege but rather as a fundamental right for all students. Equally, the right to express one’s thoughts, opinions and ideas is a foundational element in our democratic society. Failing to connect with our students and teach them how to exercise these rights in our classrooms is to fail ourselves as educators.

This mixed methods action research study examined the effectiveness of an Education and Career Action Plan (ECAP) Advisory Program on students’ formation of postsecondary education and employment plans.

The study took place at a public high school in northern Arizona. Participants included thirty-three 11th-Grade Advisory students, four 11th-grade advisors, and me, the action researcher. One quantitative data instrument and three qualitative data instruments were used for data collection. Each of the four data collection instruments provided insight about one of the study’s research questions.

The quantitative data from this study addressed whether the intervention had an impact on the ECAP Advisory Program’s ability to enhance students’ postsecondary knowledge. Results from the quantitative data demonstrated significant positive change, indicating that, through their participation in an ECAP Advisory Program, students developed their postsecondary education and employment knowledge.

The qualitative data from this study addressed how the participants experienced the intervention by providing a deeper understanding of their experiences with their ECAP Advisor and the ECAP Advisory Program. Results from the qualitative data indicated that students’ perceptions of postsecondary education and employment planning changed substantially during their participation in the ECAP Advisory Program. As the study progressed, student participants reported they could more appropriately visualize the postsecondary education and employment environments that aligned with their interests. Furthermore, because of the time allocated for lessons and activities in the ECAP Advisory Program, students participants also reported feeling more prepared to pursue postsecondary education and employment opportunities as the ECAP Advisory Program progressed. And perhaps most importantly, student participants reported that their advisor positively impacted their postsecondary education and employment planning.

Overall, in association with their participation in the ECAP Advisory Program and relationship with their ECAP Advisor, students expanded their postsecondary education and employment knowledge levels, developed and modified their education and employment goals, and felt more prepared to pursue postsecondary education and employment opportunities.

ABSTRACT

Community colleges serve an important and pivotal role in society. Neighborhood community colleges attract local students and students who attend community colleges do so for reasons including convenience and cost savings of living near or at home, lower tuition, developmental education courses, vocational training, ESL courses for English Language Learners, and a myriad of student and college resources. Community college faculty and administration work hard to meet the needs of by providing vocational and university transfer programs.

This research study is about the proliferation of online learning and the community college’s struggle to offer online course and keep students enrolled. In an effort to keep up with new educational innovations such as learning online, community colleges offer and fill online courses. However, attrition in online courses is high. Educators continue to innovate and change in areas of course design and online teaching pedagogy, but online learning lacks the physical presence of teacher-student and student-to-student contact and connectedness to the class itself. This study investigates whether it is possible, and effective, for educators to include non-content related curriculum that tries to boost student connectedness to the class, reduce stress, and increase focus so students are more likely to stay enrolled or at least gain more self-efficacy.

I chose mindfulness and its myriad of benefits to incorporate into assignments to enhance the online learning experience and keep students enrolled and passing. This study used one class section of online ENG102 students in a small, urban community college. Within the online course students were introduced mindfulness through periodic opportunities to read about and participate in mindfulness activities.

Results indicate that students still withdrew or stopped participating in the course, even after just a couple weeks and with minimal opportunity to engage in the mindfulness exercises. Students who did stay enrolled and participated in the mindfulness exercises reported that mindfulness did relieve stress and increase focus in general and when approaching course work. Attrition remained high. The implications for online educators indicate that more than just mindfulness is needed to address the attrition problem in online courses.

Keywords: mindfulness, attrition, online learning

To develop critical reasoning skills potentially advances students' ability to critically consume information, make informed decisions, and actively participate in a democracy. An inquiry-based pedagogical approach to science teaching remains an effective means to develop critical reasoning skills. Participating in scientific inquiry requires students to generate arguments and test alternative hypotheses using experimental evidence. Scientific inquiry demands that students use their critical reasoning skills. Unfortunately, many teachers fail to allocate an adequate amount of time for genuine experimentation in science classes. As a result, science classes often leave students unprepared to think critically and apply their knowledge in a practical manner.

The focus of this study was to investigate the extent to which an inquiry-based professional development experience, including a two-day summer workshop and 18 weeks of follow up Professional Learning Community (PLC) support, affected the attitudes and pedagogical skills regarding scientific inquiry among six high school biology teachers. A concurrent mixed methods, action research design was used to measure changes in teachers' attitudes, perceptions, and skills regarding inquiry-based pedagogy was measured throughout the 22 weeks of the study. A survey instrument, card sorting activity, classroom observations using the Reformed Teacher Observation Protocol (RTOP), individual interviews, and PLC observations were used to gather data. Results indicated the professional development was effective in transforming the participating teachers' attitudes, perceptions, and skills regarding inquiry-based pedagogy.

According to national data, there continues to be an ongoing achievement gap between students with disabilities and their non-disabled peers (USDE, n.d.b). This data is representative of a continued disparity in academic performance for students in local Arizona school districts. To address this gap, many districts have implemented inclusion models in which students with disabilities spend increasing amounts of time in general education classrooms, in some cases for the majority of or all of their school day. However, the persistence of the achievement gap suggests that general education teachers working in inclusion models may be lacking systematic instructional methods for ensuring access to the curriculum for those with disabilities and other diverse learning needs.

The purpose of this action research study was to examine the impact that a series of professional development workshops had on teacher beliefs and understanding of disability, intelligence, and accessible pedagogy. The study was conducted over the course of a school semester at a kindergarten through 8th grade school in a large, semi-rural school district in southeastern Arizona. Ten teachers from a variety of grade levels and subject areas participated in the study along with a school psychologist and two school administrators. Theoretical frameworks guiding this project included critical disability theory, growth mindset, universal design for learning, and transformative learning theory. A mixed-methods action research approach was used to collect both qualitative and quantitative data in the form of surveys, interviews, and written reflections. The workshop series included five modules that began with activities fostering critical reflection of assumptions regarding disability and intelligence and ended with pedagogical strategies in the form of universal design for learning.

The results indicate that the innovation was successful in reshaping participant views of disability, intelligence, and pedagogy; however, changes in classroom instruction were small. Implications for future research and practice include more extended sessions on universal design for learning and a more diverse sample of participants. Workshop sessions utilized a variety of active learning activities that were well received by participants and will be included in future professional learning plans across the district.

It is vital for schools to have qualified teachers educating our children. Institutions with teacher preparation programs supply a valuable service to their communities by providing classrooms with devoted professionals who thrive on helping children learn, and the Teachers College, where this study is set, is one such institution. The Teachers College offers two pathways to gain teacher certification: a traditional bachelor’s degree in teaching areas such as elementary, secondary, or special education, as well as master’s degrees in those same teaching areas which offer students with a bachelor’s degree in an area other than teaching, another pathway to teacher certification. Many people who receive their bachelor degrees and then return to college to earn advanced K-12 teacher education degrees are from the millennial generation. The decision to return to college to earn a master’s degree with teacher certification can be a stressful one. Millennial students seeking teacher certification often have fulltime jobs and families, and therefore need the process of returning to school to be quick and efficient. How well these prospective students communicate with the admissions staff at their school of choice will determine if they receive the information needed to complete their applications. The focus of this study is to investigate if a proactive advising text message innovation developed for this study called TextEd, used during the admission process for graduate level, teacher certification programs at the Teachers College, affected applicant communication levels and customer satisfaction through the application process. More specifically, surveys and interviews were conducted with applicants from three teacher certifications programs to determine if TextEd was an effective tool for communication with millennial applicants. Results indicated that applicants’ preferred method of communication was their cell phone, and an increased level of customer satisfaction occurred when using a proactive advising approach with text messaging during the admissions process.

Parent involvement is a concept that is used to describe the ways schools attempt to connect with parents for the educational benefit and support of students. Schools engage in strategies and invest in programs to increase parents’ involvement at and with the school, employ personnel to support parents, and develop workshops aimed at supporting parents’ understanding of academic content as well as to develop partnerships between parents and teachers.

The purpose of this study was to investigate how parents viewed themselves as partners with their children’s teachers and what they believed their roles were in their children’s education. This qualitative study was conducted through interviews with parents who were recommended by school staff as having above-average or below-average involvement. Ten parents in a low-income public school in the southwestern United States were selected for an initial interview, and four of those ten were chosen as focal parents for additional rounds of interviews. All three rounds of interviews took place over a four month period in the spring. The interviews were used to document and analyze how parents viewed themselves and the roles they have in their children’s schooling.

The findings from this study illustrate the similarities in behavior, attitude, and self-view between parents recommended by school staff as having above-average and below-average involvement. Additionally, this analysis describes how effective partnerships between home and school (including current teachers, former teachers, and school support staff) can help support parents as lifelong advocates for their children. When parents are intentionally made to feel vital as partners in their children’s schooling, their confidence in their ability to support their children’s education is strengthened.

Teacher mobility is a policy issue that affects students and school across the country. Despite a long-standing body of research related to teacher mobility, relatively little is known about how teacher-school pairings affect teachers’ decisions to stay at or leave their schools. Therefore, this study tested a model of teacher-school fit with a focus on the value that teachers and principals place on standardized test scores. Survey responses were collected from 382 K-8th grade public school teachers from 22 schools in two school districts. The results show that teachers who placed higher values on standardized test scores reported slightly higher levels of teacher-school fit and were slightly less likely to leave their schools within five years. Additionally, teachers’ self-assessed teacher-school fit showed a strong, positive relationship with teacher retention. These findings suggest that a better understanding of the factors that affect teachers’ sense of teacher-school fit may help reduce teacher mobility.